Not Myself
by kickasswicca
Summary: Warning: Character Death His death took a toll on Sara. In its own twisted way, history repeats itself.


Five AM. About the time he'd take his coat off the hook in his office and walk to his car. Except tonight it wasn't his office and it wasn't his car. Sara Sidle stood in the doorway of Grissom's office like usual, except there was no Grissom. The new paint on the walls and the flowers on the desk weren't his. The sign on the door proclaiming Catherine Willows as the new supervisor seemed like an April Fools' joke. She could imagine in her mind's eye Grissom walking up to the door, peeling the fake plate off of his and letting out a sarcastic laugh as the team giggled in the hallway.

The team rarely smiled now and Greg didn't play music in the lab anymore.

Grissom would be ecstatic at the news, she realizes. The sound of wailing and gnashing of teeth unnerved him, and some nights he'd play the classical station loudly to combat what he called "Greg's ear pollution". The sounds of Vivaldi and Bach fit him, just as the pinned butterflies and entomology textbooks did. The textbooks sat in a vacant corner in her apartment and the pinned butterflies hung in her living room. When she walks in her apartment now, it is only for a split second that she believes Grissom lives with her, his presence made believable by the flotsam and jetsam she salvaged from the lab.

Catherine was on her lunch break, so the office was open. Cath never spent time in here. Maybe she was as haunted as Sara was. Maybe she too pictured Grissom walking in, chewing on some chocolate-covered insect, and telling Catherine to get the hell out of his office.

Her eyes travel along the walls, taking in the new surroundings. She finds the slight indentation next to the filing cabinet. Where Grissom was killed. Long, lithe fingers trace its circumference, dipping slightly where Grissom's body hit the wall. She had been standing in the doorway when she felt a body push her to the ground. Sara felt a shock of pain travel from her wrists to her shoulders as she attempted to catch herself. Grissom's voice calling her name even as the man delivered the killing blow. It was bittersweet knowing that the man who had loved her for five years died with his name on her lips.

She only vaguely remembered drawing her gun and leaving the assailant's brain riddled with bullets. Grissom's name tore from her lips as the gun tumbled in the air and hit the ground with a metallic thud. Her hands gripped his sides as she struggled to keep him on his feet. She pressed kisses to his mouth, breathing into his mouth and pressing her hands into his chest. Only now did she realize how quickly she had gone into CPR. Only now does she wonder if she could have saved him. Gravity won out and the body slumped in her hands, leaving blood on her clothing and tears in her eyes.

She still didn't know who killed him. His name, his face were lost to her in a blur of movement, a glint of metal. Suspect in one of their cases, ironically told they could go free. Evidently, he knew Grissom would find out the truth. The detail that the man was psychotic was the most hurtful. She remembered that detail in painful clarity, remembering her own brush with death and the pleading in Grissom's eyes. The fear that was so clearly reflected in her own. Chills ran down her back. It was the same look that Grissom had plastered on his face at the first thrust. She wanted to believe it was quick and easy. That he hadn't felt pain. Only surprise and fear.

Sara ran her nail along the dent, scraping off bits of paint and revealing the layer underneath that was still stained with the red tint of blood that the crew had attempted to erase from the walls and their psyche. Time passed, and Sara Sidle couldn't hear the gasp Catherine Willows elicited when she returned. She barely registered the sound of a ceramic coffee cup shattering against the floor. All she knew was that the dent stood out plainly against the wall, surrounded by their initials. A crudely drawn heart encircled the carvings. Her blood joined his when a snag in the concrete aggravated Sara's ragged cuticles. It gave her comfort to see that her blood made contact with his.

She pouted like a petulant child when Catherine sat her down and cleaned her pointer with a baby wipe. Fitting, she supposed. When the wipe made contact with the wall and washed the sign of her communion with Grissom, Sara felt fire in her blood and a rushing in her ears. The thud of Catherine's and her bodies resembled the thud of the gun, but not quite. Sara pounded at Catherine's face and drew pleasure at the dark bruises blossoming under her fists.

The boys ran in and Nick picked her effortlessly off the ground and twisted her arms behind her back. The string of profanities flowing from her mouth finally registered as Warrick let loose with a couple as he cradled Catherine. Sara could only think that a scraping of under Cath's fingernails would confirm it all. That Sara attacked Catherine and, by proxy, Grissom was dead. The finality hit her and the profanities turned to wails and screams. She beat Nick's chest with her fists, mildly disappointed that his skin didn't turn colors at all.

The cool metal of the handcuffs encircled her wrists in a way that felt like a comfort. It echoed the feel of the chair beneath her. How many times had she sat across from this table? How many times had she observed through the glass? i

She would plead insanity. And it would all be true. Gil Grissom would be gone and she would in the psych ward with the very criminals she had investigated the day Gil Grissom worried for her safety. All because of her DNA under Catherine Willows's nails.

There were some days when she hated her job.


End file.
